31: The Legacy of Home

Romans 8: 35, 37-39

35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors

through him that loved us.

38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,

39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The Legacy of Home

2/3/08

Who am I? Why does He want me?

Why does being His daughter give me value? Why should I have any rights? How dare I make any claim on Him? Why should my existence have value to Him or anyone?

Only in doing good. But I am not perfect, so when I am not good, where is the justification for inflicting myself on others?

I have chosen Him. I will never want to change that choice. At times I am appalled by my audacity and ashamed of the nothing He has claimed as His own. A voice whispers that this should not be so, but could someone please explain to me Why?

This is the strongest example of the psychology of the abused finding voice in my poem journal. This is what is left behind after constant belittlement, ridicule, torment, and disgust by abusers. The feeling you must be perfect, that you have no worth, the shame of existing in the first place, and if you can see that it's not supposed to be that way, the complete incomprehension of why, how.

The gospel, church, taught me the difference between what was and what should be. Years of protection by hundreds of miles away from home has begun to teach me how life can be without the abuse. As I find peace and security in the healthy, the hurt has less hold and sway and the further I get in healing, the faster I'm able to make progress.

The scriptures teach the why. The fact is that God does love me. He does not and never has seen me the way I was taught to see myself. As I recognize and accept His love and patience with and acceptance of others around me I can begin to consider the same for myself. It may not make sense to the me raised at home, but it no longer has to because I can recognize the lunacy of life at home. And that home is no more for me so I am free of it to focus on what is: that God does love me and He wants me back with Him.

27: The Choice of Jerusalem

Mosiah 26: 3

And now because of their unbelief

they could not understand the word of God;

and their hearts were hardened.

The Choice of Jerusalem

Summer 07, 1/6/08, 2/1/08

Had I been in Jerusalem

The time The King first came

Would I have mocked, and spurned, and scorned

His Blessed, Holy Name?

Would I have walked in wondering steps

The path that Jesus trod?

Would I have known those steps to mark

The only way to God?

I am not in Jerusalem

But still I have this choice

To stray or fight the truth He speaks

Or heed His Holy Voice.

You, as well, must make your choice

For hope He died to give

To heed or hate, the choice is yours,

His gift that we might live.

The Jewish religion is one of the oldest in the world. It was the parent of Christianity. Yet so few of the Jews were willing to recognize the Messiah when He came because He was not the answer they wanted.

Here, in this time, I was raised in Christianity and understand how and why it had to be as it was - the suffering Messiah before the conquering Messiah. But if I was not raised to understand, I wonder how foreign and strange it would seem to me. Sometimes I try to think of the world and how I would perceive everything without this knowledge and then how I would react to someone telling me of the gospel. It has allowed me build a stronger testimony of its truth and I hope I would have had the strength of character to truly listen, consider, and accept it had I been there back then.